Publisher and writer Naim Attallah reflects on the loss of his old friend
David Frost, who died recently

I woke last Sunday, on a bright and beautiful morning, at my usual hour of 5am but my enthusiasm for the day was shortlived. I learnt that my dear friend David Frost had died at the relatively young age of seventy-four and the news left me shattered.

His passing brought home to me the irrefutable fact that death keeps no calendar. In many ways, I always considered him a soul mate whose company I cherished from the first day I laid eyes on him. We seemed to have clicked and found many a zone of comfort that was to cement a friendship which developed naturally without either of us ever having to work on it.

The tragedy of his death was so sudden that its impact has had a devastating effect on all those who knew him well. He was robust, full of zest for life and hardly betrayed any signs of ill health; on the contrary, he was still as active as ever, interviewing people on Al Jazeera’s English TV channel. So his passing away as a result of a heart attack is, by its very nature, particularly hard to come to terms with.

David was a loyal friend, whose worldwide success never infringed on his relationships with people. He was always available when one needed him. I first met David in 1975 through his good friend the agent and producer Richard Armitage, who had persuaded me to invest in what was to become one of the most successful English musicals, Me and My Girl.

As I always hankered to be involved in film production, David and I formed Parradine Co-Productions Ltd, to produce a new adaptation of Cinderella. It was to be a collaborative effort, with the late Bryan Forbes and legendary song-writing brothers, Richard and Robert Sherman, writing twelve original songs for the film.

It was an ambitious project requiring a £2 million budget. The resulting film, The Slipper and the Rose, was selected as the Royal Command Performance Film of 1976, and received its premiere at the Odeon, Leicester Square. As I stood with David waiting to be presented to the royal patrons, HM The Queen Mother and HRH Princess Margaret, with the flashing lights of the media scrum all around us, I felt I had entered a new world thanks to him. And it heralded the beginning of a friendship which was to grow and last for almost four decades.

Since Sunday, I have been reflecting on what made David so loveable as a human being, so generous with his time, and why it was that I found him to be a breath of fresh air in a world so occupied with superficiality and so defined by a lack of compassion towards those less fortunate than ourselves.

What was our common denominator, I pondered. I hope and trust that his widow, Lady Carina, will understand the sentiment when I say that what bound us together was our love of women.

We both adored their company; were enticed by their fragrant bodily aroma and felt totally rejuvenated in their presence. It was clear from our early conversations that we had spent our bachelor days with a similar carefree abandon, sowing those proverbial wild oats and taking full advantage of what were to become more permissive times.

David was a bon viveur who lived his life to the full. I recall the first time he took me to lunch at what was then called the Hyde Park Hotel in Knightsbridge. It was grouse season, a plate of which he ordered for both of us. To see him gorge the bird with his hands and the relish on his face as he ate every bit of it was worthy of a master class in lack of inhibition. That, to me, was the best English insouciance I had ever encountered.

It was the same abandon when I went to meet him at his bachelor flat in Kensington and see him devour a whole plate of radishes as if they were peanuts. Funnily enough, the habit took hold of me and I became a radish addict as well.

His energy was stupendous. He worked extremely hard and adapted himself to any condition wherever he happened to be. He never complained or whinged, but took things in his stride without any hint of frustration or irritation. He was, what I would term, a cool cat who never felt alien in any environment. His laugh came straight from the belly and would make anyone else grow fat.

I learned a great deal from him. Watching him interview the great and the learned on television made me more proficient interviewing people in print. His professionalism rubbed off well on me and I surely owe him a tutoring example that helped me along as my confidence in interviewing public figures improved with the passage of time.

We often bumped into each other at airports when he would cheerfully greet me at the top of his voice, unfazed by the multitude of passengers around, calling out: ‘Hallo, sweet prince!’ – an affectionate expression I’m unlikely to ever forget, despite my embarrassment whenever it happened at the time. That was the measure of the man who went out of his way to acknowledge his friends whatever the circumstances.

David was endowed with a prodigious memory for names. He would remember the names of your children, having met them only once. The same applied to the wives of his friends and their many friends. He never spoke ill of anyone and had a wonderful sense of humour.

He was a caring family man, a good host, treated everyone with great affability and made you feel the equal of any celebrity in his presence. That was his most amazing virtue.

David persuaded me to publish a limited edition of poems entitled Songs to Bedroom Walls by the actress, Susan George, then best known as a great friend of HRH the Prince of Wales. It was an extravagant production with expensively reproduced paintings by Andrew Hewkin and a preface by Peter Ustinov. Launched with a glittering party at the Savoy, the whole endeavour was as much a tribute to David’s enthusiasm as the haunting lyricism of the verse.

On top of all these qualities he had a natural warmth, oozed an abundance of bonhomie, was at ease with people from all walks of life and was certainly a great communicator. I shall always miss him, miss the resonance of his voice over the telephone and our frequent breakfast rendezvous at the Wolseley in Piccadilly, where we invariably enjoyed a light-hearted conversation punctuated with a little harmless gossip.

While mourning his death, I wish him a safe and comfortable journey to Heaven where I’m sure he will be welcomed with open arms. My only other consolation, knowing David the way I did, is that it will not take him long before he embarks on a series of interviews with the Saints – even perhaps the Angels – and eventually find a heavenly means to send us the labour of his new work.

I shall no doubt be restless, waiting to receive his dispatches from beyond. At least he will be the first to tell us what it’s like to be surrounded by Angels and along the way, as usual, score another all-time exclusive.